The House GOP’s budget, which passed last month, takes a hatchet to programs for disabled kids and Special Olympics athletes. The proposed cuts could force the closure of at least one Special Olympics program, which is funded through the Department of Education. Dubbed Project UNIFY, the program serves more than 750,000 students in 43 states and draws from techniques used in Special Olympics training for activities in public schools.

The program includes sports teams that pair disabled athletes with nondisabled athletes; developmental activities for young children with disabilities; and anti-discrimination programs to combat bullying in schools. Special Olympics president and CEO Tim Shriver has said the program is at the forefront of a national movement to fight bias against the disabled and, in a recent interview on MSNBC, he denounced the GOP cuts: “It wasn’t a haircut—it was a guillotine job for the programs for health and education for children with special needs.”

I can’t decide if they are doing this just because they are mean-spirited assholes who care nothing about anyone other than the super-rich who should get tax cuts every six months, or if they are just going after it because the Kennedy’s were involved.

The safe bet is probably both.

Although, in fairness, I am sure Reason magazine will have a Nick Gillespie video up outlining a free-market solution for this. I mean, were you ever charged tickets to attend the special olympics? Why not? What about jersey sales and concession profits. There are all sorts of revenue streams there, no doubt. Pull yourself up by your bootstraps, you slackers.

I can’t understand how such hate-filled, disgusting assholes gained power, nor can I understand how they have any support, but my BP skyrocketed overnight and I’m in a terrible fight with my partner on whether or not to allow our pet to die with some dignity or let him linger on starving himself and huddled in a corner until his poor old body gives out. Between outside news and inside news, I’m giving up on humanity, happiness and bacon.

Seriously. We had a failed school levy in our area, that resulted in a varsity sport at the high school costing over $600 per sport. Someone I know said, ‘oh, it’ll be fine. The kids who really want to be there will be there, and the pain in the butt kids will stay home.’

You know who really needs those kinds of programs? The Pain in the Butt kids. I wonder if Sarah Palin has been asked about this…

@ruemara: I’m terribly sorry about your situation with your partner and your pet. Please don’t forget that your partner is coming from the same place you are with regards to your pet. You’re just not going TO the same place. That’s rough stuff, and I hope you guys can work it out for the critter’s sake.
Having said that, I gave up on humanity a long time ago. But I’ll never give up on bacon.

@Mike Kay (Ding-Dong-Broder’s Dead): @JPL:
Families with special needs kids should just work harder to take care of their own. That’s how Sarah does it. She’s just a regular hardworking commonsense patriotic freedom-loving American. If she can do it, so can they!

Wow, I never imagined they’d take their stupid “personal responsibility” nonsense (and big lie) to its logical extreme. Now literally everyone will need to pull themselves up by the bootstraps. Eeeeegad.

The GOP couldn’t come up with safe areas to cut (you know, waste, fraud and abuse), so they put together a lot of cuts knowing that the cuts would never actually occur after negotiations with Senate Dems and President Obama. They just wanted to hit their $100B $61B target and the actual substance of the cuts wasn’t particularly thought out. They would shit nails if port security or immigration funds were actually cut, but those are in the list, too.

IOW, the GOP voted on the cuts without really knowing, or caring about the specifics. Special Olympics funds will be restored after the grand compromise with Senate Dems and President Obama.

Things can only be funded by the federal government! Anyone who doesn’t think something should be funded by the Fed must hate that thing and not want it to exist! These are the only logically possible positions!

@ruemara: I’m sorry your pet is in such an extreme condition. Having helped a friend to make a similar decision about his beloved Dobie, I feel for you. I hope you are able to let your pet go with dignity.
It is the right thing to do for the pet and your peace of mind (and your partner, although your partner may not realize it now). I hope the situation is resolved sooner rather than later.

The GOP wants to force women to give birth to disabled children in order for them to be displayed in circuses and freak shows just like in the old days. These people are all sadists, depraved, worthless specimens of the human species.

The only good thing about all this is that when the day of reckoning comes there will be tens of millions of Americans who will have been stripped of all compassion for their “betters”. Perhaps a certain amount of venom is necessary to bring about real change.

The Special Olympics were founded by the late Eunice Shriver. As I recall, she had a son-in-law who was a prominent Republican politician, Arnold Somethingorother. Then again she was a Kennedy and a liberal, so maybe that trumps the Republican connection.

@Yutsano:
Sorry, who is who when you say “they”? If you mean the GOP going after the firefighters and police unions, then I’m all for it. No one should be exempt. It seems the firefighters understand this a little, based on the bank protests.

Conservatives, for reasons that I don’t quite understand, really hate the idea of self-esteem. Kids are in the special olympics because they can’t compete with other kids. That the kids and their parents gain from this is overshadowed by the fact that self-esteem is involved. Self-esteem ranks right up their with relativism and empathy as the liberal values which must be destroyed if we are to save our society from it’s enemies. The more we attack those kids, the better off we’ll be.

Well, they’ve already convinced me that my life is not only worthless but that the entire country hates me and deservedly so, seeing as I’m a brown liberal part-time student who can be either mistaken for a dirty Messican illegal or a swarthy Mooslim terrist, depending on how much sun I got the day before.

@Violet: Sorry, early morning (for me anyway but I shan’t brag) and I was unclear there. I am referring to the GOP here. Dickheads will do anything their rich overlords say just to get a tiny sliver of their table scraps.

She has a whole series listed under “Saying Goodbye” in the right-hand column of the site, so there are several articles on the whole topic of pet illness, death, and mourning.

When our cat Natasha was dying of cancer, the vet told us that it was all about her quality of life. As long as she was still functioning (eating, drinking, peeing and pooping) and interacting with us, her quality of life was probably fine. If she started hiding or stopped doing any of the above, that’s when you need to seriously consider euthanizing the cat so it doesn’t have to suffer.

I am so sorry. If it helps at all to convey to your partner, years ago when one of my beloved doggies reached that stage, I — hoping to avoid the inevitable — asked my vet hopefully if an old dog might just pass away peacefully in his sleep. Her response was, “that hardly ever happens.”

While she served as Alaska’s governor, Sarah Palin attempted to halve funding for the state’s branch of the Special Olympics. (The proposal didn’t pass muster, and the final budget actually included a slight increase in funding.)

I had to make the decision to put my parent’s cat to sleep last fall while my dad was out of the country. I regret complying with his wishes (which involved intensive care) instead of letting our sweet kitty spend a little while in some grass in the sun, and then going to sleep. I know however, that my father would have had a hard time forgiving me if I had made that decision in his absence.

I hope you can find find some resolution with your partner. It is going to hurt to lose your furry friend, but if you don’t come to some agreement about how he goes, you will both end up resenting each other. (There is nothing like a little anger to take the edge of grief.)

@Kryptik: They can’t just pass something like that in the leg. and have it take effect. Recalls are in the state constitution. The fact that they are trying to do it shows that they have gone ’round the bend though. Seriously, the Republicans’ behavior ver the past two days indicates to me that they just don’t care about appearances, rules, or anything but their short term agenda.

@Omnes Omnibus: Seriously, the Republicans’ behavior ver the past two days indicates to me that they just don’t care about appearances, rules, or anything but their short term agenda.

That’s what’s really fascinating to me about their current power-drunk bender. One of the things that really impressed me about the early Bush Administration is how much they represented the long game — I mean, the GWB admin represented the culmination of a power consolidation that had been in the works since Nixon. But once they got there, they’ve gotten more and more reckless with what they worked so long to attain. Maybe it’s because they opened the gate for themselves and the lunatics rushed in too.

I’m still not totally convinced that they can’t just suddenly invent some law to unilaterally pass that will inoculate them completely from recalls. But that’s because the assholes have proven remarkably adept at doing that exact sort of thing in order to destroy the great Lib scourge. From the Citizens United ruling, to the Michigan ‘Koch Township Buyout Bill of 2011’, they’ve managed to do just about everything they want wantonly, damn whatever constitution they have to burn to get their way.

well I see no reason why the GOP of Wisconsin wouldn’t just do away with the recall of publicly elected officials altogether. Obviously they were put into power by the good people of Wisconsin so that must mean that they have a mndate to serve in perpetuity, then have the right to pass down their positions through the oldest child to ensure that Wisconsin has the representation that it deserves.

OT via Steve Benen: Bobo has evidently decided that he does “do humor” after all: asked to opine about the Gnewt’s prospective candidacy, he quipped pithily “I wouldn’t trust that guy to run a 7 Eleven, let alone a country.”

My brother is severely mentally handicapped, and he has participated in the Special Olympics. I don’t think that this is a simple issue in a non-perfect world where government’s ability to help everyone has limits. The government already pays for everything relating to his room, board, and 24/7 care. How much is it fair for me to ask? That is all.

You’re making the same grave mistake as all Dirty Fucking Hippies do: Assuming that Mooslims are or deserve to be even considered Americans to begin with. Thank god we have Rep. King to set all our stupid brown asses straight.

@Poopyman: Not to beat a dead horse on this, but I have serious doubts that this law will go into effect any time soon. Within five minutes of the bill being signed, the first lawsuit challenging and seeking an injunction against its enforcement will be filed.

Because it’s so easy to find replacement firefighters and police officers on a moment’s notice.

Heck, if the teachers strike in sufficiently large numbers, they’ll have to teach kids in the auditorium just to have enough substitutes to keep an eye on everyone.

ETA: This is what unions have strike funds for. Hopefully they’re sufficiently funded. Here in Los Angeles, when the grocery store workers went on strike, it dragged on long enough that they ended up doing food drives.

No, just that religion has replaced political beliefs this time around. (See: McCarthy)

This is, in fact, the oldest story in America. Used to do it to witches.

Every 30-50 years, the pearl-clutchers get their dander up about something stupid, and we all have to sit through a stupid charade while they do their stupid shit, and then a few years later everyone looks back and says “Duh, that was stupid”. When I was a kid, Ozzy Osbourne caused suicide and day-cares were filled with baby-killing Satan-worshipers.

Todd Pearson — Thanks for injecting a credible opinion that doesn’t reduce the issue to a simple partisan mud-flinging contest.

I actually like Reason Magazine, and my initial reflex upon reading John Cole’s post was to try to defend Nick Gillespie. Unfortunately, the truth is that Gillespie has been quite the hack ever since Obama was sworn in.

I think the general public in Wisconsin is sufficiently riled up that strikers would have their support. When the grocery stores in So Cal tried to break the unions, their stores were practically empty as people went to independent or union stores instead, and that strike went on for four and a half months. When UPS went on strike, pundits predicted a huge public backlash and were shocked that people actually supported them.

When these strikes affect someone you actually know — the grocery store clerk you see every week, the UPS guy who brings your packages every day — they have a lot more support than a strike by strangers.

I’m still not totally convinced that they can’t just suddenly invent some law to unilaterally pass that will inoculate them completely from recalls.

If the WI AG is GOP, too– who will enforce the recall law as it stands now? Won’t be him. And it’s not like the Feds or SCOTUS will step in to help the citizens of Wisconsin against their rogue state govt.

I believe a recent President referred to the US Constitution as “a goddamned piece of paper” not too long ago. In hindsight, he sounds like a moderate today.

I crossed the lines twice in those 4 months, and apologized to the picketers when I did so. I had no time to drive to the independent stores both times. What was remarkable was how truly bad the replacements were that were doing the checking. One checker* had to ask a customer what the vegetable was that she had placed before him: Brussels sprouts. This was a white guy in his 40s, no accent, not even an out-of-state one. He grew up here. Maybe his mom never fed him vegetables, but seriously, where do you find someone like this?

*I almost referred to him as the scab checker but that would have sounded really bad.

Thanks to all of you for the kind words. We finally agreed that any kitty that will starve himself for over a week is a kitty that is done with things, thank you please. Our beloved first cat has gone to the Cat Heaven, where mice and birds are fat and slow, every meal is fresh salmon, shrimp and herring and there are laps galore. We were at odds a lot and thank you Werebear, your website improved his last year tons. I thought I was completely prepared to lose him since he’d been so sick for the past few years but at the end, I seemed to made of tears, and snot. As a photographer, I couldn’t help but take lots of pics, but the best stuff is from almost a decade ago and not digital. Rest well, Smudge, somewhere up there, a little tuxedo cat is spinning on a broken office chair seat, tail waving in the air and having a ball making himself dizzy.

The government already pays for everything relating to his room, board, and 24/7 care. How much is it fair for me to ask?

I guess my retort would be, you’re not the one asking. Your brother is.

I think it’s our responsibility as a society to do everything we can to make every citizen healthy and productive. My cousin who is retarded has gotten a huge amount of services over the course of her life and, thanks to those services, at the age of 45 she was able to move into her own condo (it had been my grandmother’s until she passed away, and my aunt and uncle bought it from the rest of the family), hold down a part-time job, and have some measure of independence.

Seventy years ago, she would have been sent off to a state institution and lived her life there staring at the walls. It would have been a much, much cheaper solution, especially since she probably wouldn’t have lived to her current age, but aren’t we all better off having her be a productive citizen participating in society to the best of her ability?

What chafes my ass is that not only are these Republicans mean-spirited, but that they and their supporters are so fundamentally UNSERIOUS in their proposals to cut expenditures. They nickel-and-dime, proposing cuts to programs that they don’t personally benefit from, while the big elephant (I use the word advisedly) is military expenditures.

The Democrats aren’t much better but at least they don’t propose cuts on the backs of the poorest and neediest. USUALLY.

We’ve got to band together and throw these sociopathic Republicans out. If we can actually unite enough to that, I think we might have enough collective clout to let the Democrats know that they’d better get serious about helping the majority of people or we’ll vote them out, too.

Todd Pearson, do you mind if I ask you where you live? Cause we’re not getting much help in paying for our kid’s (on the autism spectrum) needs, and the way things are going around here, I won’t be surprised if the little bit of assistance we do get is yanked away. Maybe we’ll move to your part of the country.

Shorter Todd Pearson: I got mine, baby! (And he did get his, because not too long ago, his brother would have been living with and completely dependent on him.)

Mnemosyne: Actually, I’m “asking” because I’m now his legal guardian, and we personally pay for everything that the State does not.

I was thinking in more of a philosophical way — the things that the government does for your brother are not (or should not be) done for the benefit of your family. They’re done for his benefit. Yes, you guys also benefit, but that’s a side effect. If you became unable to care for your brother, he would become a ward of the state, and that’s because most people recognize that he’s a person in his own right and we can’t leave him to starve if his family becomes unable to care for him.

As far as questions about his actual care go, that’s up to you, and I do not envy you those decisions at all. But I do think you should be able to get all of the assistance you need for him without having rich assholes whine about their crippling 35% tax rate on income over $379,150.

ETA: And this will probably make me sound like a bad person to some people, but I don’t think you should be required to impoverish yourself before you can get care for him because, again, the care is being provided for him, not for you.

Sorry for the delay in responding. We’ve never participated in Special Olympics but I know it has been a life-changing program for many and I know how hard the road we special needs families travel is. I would never begrudge another special needs family ANYTHING they found helpful — though I have certainly been jealous when I’ve heard about a program somewhere else that sounds like it might be a good fit for my kid and it isn’t available to us.

Yes, I was snippy. I should have said, Hey! Let’s stick together here! And everything Mnemosyne said.

[…] This is just cruel: The GOP is being “mean-spirited” by targeting the Special Olympics, says John Cole at Balloon Juice. Or maybe this assault has to do with the organization’s Kennedy connection — CEO Tim […]

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[…] This is just cruel: The GOP is being “mean-spirited” by targeting the Special Olympics, says John Cole at Balloon Juice. Or maybe this assault has to do with the organization’s Kennedy connection — CEO Tim […]